


The Hero of the Herald

by epistretes



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Angst, Arranged Marriage, Blood, Casteless, Character Death, Dwarven Politics, F/F, F/M, Fighting, Graphic Violence, Grief, Hero Worship, because just transcribing a scene is boring, dark ritual declined, dust town and the carta, game scene with some dialogue changed, mentions of other Origins characters, old tegrin, the carta, you’ve probably already seen it anyway if you are reading this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-23
Updated: 2014-12-23
Packaged: 2018-03-03 01:42:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,843
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2833538
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/epistretes/pseuds/epistretes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Malika Cadash had grown up hero-worshipping the Warden Aeducan.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Hero of the Herald

**Author's Note:**

> Based on my own Warden and Inquisitor. Sereda and Malika both have short, red hair with braids and green eyes.

There had always been rumours from the stone and when rumours of an exiled princess of the Aeducan line reach surface dwarves, that rumour spreads like wildfire. As a child, I, Malika Cadash, lived for the updates of the exploits of Sereda Aeducan with a fervour. She had been exiled for the murder of her brother Trian, but the Carta had heavy, if supposedly secret, ties to the casteless and merchants of Orzammar still. More whispers spread that she had been framed by her younger brother, Bhelen and that King Endrin had died refusing to pass his throne on to his remaining son.

In-fighting began in Orzammar between Harrowmont and Aeducan for the throne while the woman who should have been Queen after her father was exiled to the Deep Roads to die fighting the darkspawn. A tragic tale in itself, but of course, it did not stop there.

“Malika, my little one,” my mother cooed to me as she brushed my somewhat unruly red hair that she tied in to a braid on one side, trying to get me to finally fall asleep. “I heard today that Lady Aeducan was conscripted in to the Grey Wardens. Old Tegrin told your father this evening. He was selling some elfroot to the Wardens on their way to the camp in Ostagar.” Well, for all of her good intentions, my mother did not sleep a wink that night as she was barraged by eager questions from her excited and unruly offspring.

\-----

“Malika, just hold still!” My father was about ready to throw me in to the river and make me learn how to swim if I carried on as I was, but I was too excited to heed him. 

“But Da, is it true that the Lady Aeducan survived the massacre at Ostagar?” My little heart had broken when I had learned of the fate of the Wardens. I had often swung around twin sticks, playing pretend at being conscripted along with the fallen princess some day.

“That is what I heard.” My father agreed and my heart leaped with joy, if my father had said it was true, well - it must be. My hero had lived to see another day.

The missives came weekly and I was always looking forward to hearing more news of my hero. She had saved the Arling of Redcliffe, along with Dwyn, who was a personal friend of my father’s. She had healed the Arl of Redcliffe and the carta rejoiced, because having Redcliffe open again made it far easier to smuggle lyrium to our contacts at Kinloch Hold. A surface dwarf always looks out for other surface dwarves and it felt like she was already worthy of being a paragon to me and mine.

The Dalish elves even agreed to join her though our people were as different as stone and cheese. She would really have been an excellent Queen, a diplomatic soul who could also fight to back herself up when needed. I pictured myself one day, in her service and making the name of Cadash one to be venerated again and not just spoken in whispers. We were not just Cadash, we _were_ the Carta. Even such a mighty institution as that must fall if we left it.

She cleared out Soldier’s Peak and restored it to the Wardens, she was the only known being to have an _actual_ golem at her service, she was tearing mercilessly through Teryn Loghain’s forces all throughout Ferelden and made tongues wag that perhaps such a warrior would not ever have betrayed former King Cailan. Perhaps, just _perhaps_ Teryn Loghain was wrong? Most of this went over my small head, but I understood the whispers when I looked back on them.

In Orzammar, she made the most headway with the Carta, considering that she killed Jarvia and wiped out almost all of our casteless contacts. Some of the surfacers cursed her name at that, until they realised that they could simply start anew with a new carta leader in Dust Town. Clear out the rot that Jarvia had allowed to set in and soon, the gold was flowing once more. She then did as many expected, she deposed her brother and crowned Harrowmont the King. I would have, too, in her place. Bhelen might have been more sympathetic to the Casteless, but he was also a heartless murdering bastard and had exiled her. She was not forgiving of that.

Tales of the Warden and her party flowed like ale at our dinners and I memorised the names of all of them with relish. It was said that she traveled most places with her faithful Mabari, that she had named Endrin, an Orlesian Chantry Lay-Sister named Leliana, her fellow Warden, Alistair and an elf by the name of Zevran who was rumoured to have been an Antivan Crow. It was all very exciting and exotic and I dreamed of the day I might too one day be a Warden.

Then, the Archdemon attacked Denerim. Little of the politics I understood, something about the Grey Warden Alistair actually being the King or something and Lady Aeducan killed the treacherous Loghain. I also recall being confused as to why Alistair married his half-brother’s widow but as I got older, I more understood the nuances of the politics of rule. 

I was out in the fields, far away from Denerim in the Free Marches and attacking a dummy with blunted knives as had become my custom. I saw in the dummy a darkspawn and I attacked it with vigour, sweat pouring down my brow as I mercilessly killed my foe. My father came up quietly behind me and I decapitated the dummy, leaving straw everywhere when I turned to him, worry suffusing my soul as I saw his face.

“Da?”

“Malika, my girl, the Fifth Blight is ended.” I frowned, I could not understand why he seemed so sad, surely that was good news?

“Did the Lady Aeducan kill it? Does all of Thedas know she is a hero?”

“They do and she did.” I smiled, all of the world would know that a dwarf girl was their hero, had saved the entirety of Thedas. “Malika, she died when she killed the Archdemon.”

I remember little of the next few weeks other than alternating between anger and sorrow, sometimes both combined and I sobbed for the woman who had been my hero and the person I wanted to emulate when I grew up. My mother nor my father could break me from the cycle and I cursed the name of the Wardens for allowing her to die.

Thedas thanked her, but not the dwarves from whom she had come. King Alistair and Queen Anora declared the Warden the Hero of Ferelden and many statues were erected across Ferelden - and even some in the Marches - of her valour. 

“Malika?” My mother’s voice penetrated the fog of despair and I blinked up at her, tears still soaking my eyes. “King Harrowmont put it to the Assembly to post-humously make Lady Aeducan a Paragon. He has had the Shaperate record the memories that she was wrongly accused of Prince Trian’s death and that she saved us all.”

Those were the words that made me stop crying. She _would_ be remembered and revered as a hero. She deserved to live to see it, but this was the best that could be done with her light gone from the world.

When my mother left me to my own devices, I sharpened my blades on a whetstone and shaved off a piece of my hair just by where my mother braided it for me every morning. A piece of me was gone, had died with the Hero of Ferelden and I would remember how she made me feel, how she inspired me forever more. That I swore.

\----

“Leliana?” I had the good fortune of catching her alone and I desperately wanted to speak with her.

“Yes, Herald?” She turned to me with those sad, dark eyes. The only time I had ever seen her look at me differently was when I had first woken up and she saw my eyes. She had looked shocked before pulling Cassandra back from me.

“Did you know the Hero of Ferelden?” I had to ask, what were the chances that this Orlesian former chantry lay-sister named Leliana was _not_ the one from the tales I heard as a child in the Marches?

“I did.” It took her a long moment to reply and I saw the hurt in her eyes.

“I thought you must be the same Leliana. I loved hearing tales of you as a child in the Free Marches,” I went on, excitedly. “I wanted to be a Warden, just like the Lady Aeducan. She was my hero… she still is, actually.”

“I can see why. A fellow dwarf woman rising through human lands to be venerated - not unlike yourself.” Her words were a little clipped and controlled, but I did not notice just at that moment.

“She was so like me - a redheaded female dwarf living on the surface, casteless and yet she was so unlike me. I was born that way, she was born a royal. It didn’t matter to me, I lived for the stories of her.” I lifted my hand subconsciously to the shaved part of my hair.

“You touch your head just there when you are thinking, you know,” Leliana told me softly. “You might want to look in to that if you ever wish to play poker.”

“Oh, this? I er… well, I actually did that when I heard the Lady Aeducan had died defeating the Archdemon.” The admittance made Leliana start and that was when I realised she was acting strangely. “I felt like a little part of me had died when she did. I had to grow up and not just live for the exploits of another to reach me. I took that part of myself to always remind me what she sacrificed and to never let myself do any less.”

“Please do not,” Leleiana near-whispered.

“Not do what?”

“Please do not give your life for your cause. I cannot watch anyone else important to me die. You are the Herald of Andraste. You must defeat what is in front of you, you cannot leave someone behind to mourn.” There was a steeliness to her voice, an urgency. I knew instantly that she was not pleading for herself, I knew I could not hide my growing closeness with another from my Spymaster, after all.

“I promise.”

“If you are done asking questions, I have much to do.” I turned to go and stopped, something dawning on me belatedly.

“She was your love, wasn’t she?”

“She was my everything.” I could not reply, I turned and left and touched my hand to the shaved part of my head. I had found my purpose, I had found my goal and I would not lose sight of it. _I will look after her for you. I promise._


End file.
